ETRIT DEMAJ | 27 |

COO, Hepta Systems

It was the morning after his 10th birthday that Etrit Demaj left behind everything he knew.

It was 1999. He and his family were in Kosovo and the bombs and the guns and the soldiers walking through his hometown meant an ethnic war was escalating. That morning, his mom looked him in the eyes and told him she had sewn money into the waist of the jeans he was wearing and if they were to be separated — if something unthinkable were to happen to her or to his dad or his older brother — he should keep the money hidden and use it to travel as far toward the country's border as he could.

His family survived the evacuation; their journey took three months. Eventually, they settled in Southeast Michigan — Rochester Hills, specifically — and from all of that Demaj learned never to take freedom, or opportunity, for granted.

Today, Demaj runs the daily operations of Hepta Systems, a Detroit-based manager of smart building technology. Demaj is in the business of making buildings smarter — from the heating and cooling to the lighting to the window shades. Hepta's largest client is Dan Gilbert's Bedrock Real Estate Services, an account Demaj oversees.

"I hired him at a young age because I have always put a lot of faith in the young and hungry; I also wanted the company to grow more as a family," said Hepta President Ted Houck. Since Demaj joined the company last year, Hepta sales have grown by 300 percent and employees have more than doubled from 18 to 40.

Demaj is also busy growing an online residential real estate service he launched last year. Called Reozom.com, it works like a virtual listing agent; Demaj said his goal is to make buying or selling a home as easy as posting on social media. The service has listed 1,000 homes and has been used by over 1,200 agents. It's on pace to double last year's $130,000 in revenue.

Through all of this success in business, Demaj has never forgotten where he came from: he makes regular return trips to Kosovo to work with entrepreneurs in the growing technology space there.

"All I see is young people who are hungry for success and opportunity. Hope is alive again in Kosovo thanks to the United States' willingness to intervene," he said.